rated from her husband,-the many pleasing images of nature which are intermixed in this part of the story, with its gradual and regular progress to the fatal catastrophe, -are so very remarkable, that it would be superfluous to point out their respective beauties.

I have avoided mentioning any particular similitudes in my remarks on this great work, because I have given a general account of them in my observations on the first book; there is one, however, in this part of the poem, which I shall here notice, as it is not only very beautiful, but the closest of any in the whole poem; I mean that where the serpent is described as rolling forward in all his pride, animated by the evil spirit and conducting Eve to her destruction, while Adam was at too great a distance from her to give her his assistance.

That secret intoxication of pleasure, with all those transient flushings of guilt and joy, which the poet represents in our first parents upon their eating the forbidden fruit, to those flaggings of spirit, damps of sorrow, and mutual accusations which succeed it, are conceived with a wonderful imagination and described in very natural sentiments. When Dido, in the fourth Æneid, yielded to that fatal temptation which ruined her, Virgil tells us, the earth trembled, the heavens were filled with flashes of lightning, and the nymphs howled upon the mountain tops. Milton, in the same poetical spirit, has described all nature upon Eve's eating the forbidden fruit: upon Adam's falling into the same guilt, the whole creation appears a second time in convulsions. As all nature suffered by the guilt of our first parents, these symptoms of trouble and consternation are wonderfully imagined, not only as prodigies, but as marks of her sympathizing in the fall of man.-ADDISON.

BOOK X.

INTRODUCTORY REMARKS.

CERTAINLY Milton has in this book shown to an amazing extent all the variety of his powers in striking contrast with each other: the sublimity of the celestial persons; the gigantic wickedness of the infernal; the mingled excellence and human infirmities of Adam and Eve; and the shadowy and terrific beings of Sin and Death. Of any other poet, the imagination would have been exhausted in the preceding books: in Milton, it still gathers strength, and grows bolder and bolder, and darts with moré expanded wings. When Sin and Death deserted the gates of hell, and made their way to earth, the conception and expression of all the circumstances are of a supernatural force.

For my part, I see no adequate reason why the whole of an epic poem should not consist of allegorical or shadowy beings; nor do I see even why they should not be mixed in action with those imaginary persons who represent realities; certainly the poetical parts of the Scriptures everywhere embody such shadowy existences.

Sin and Death might have flown through the air from hell to earth as shadowy personifications, without the aid of a bridge of matter, but this ought not to have prohibited the poet from picturing a bridge of matter, if his imagination led him to that device. It was intended to typify the facility of access contrived by Sin and Death from hell to this terrestrial globe, not only for themselves, but for all their ministers and innumerable followers. The moral is obvious: what is intended to be conveyed is, though figuratively told, in perfect concurrence with our faith, instead of shocking it. We must cut away all the most impressive parts of poetry, if we do not allow these figurative inventions.

It may be admitted that it requires a rich mind duly to enjoy and appreciate these grand and spiritual agencies; they therefore who have cold conceptions, eagerly catch hold of these censures to justify their own insensibility; they can understand illustrations drawn from objects daily in solid forms before their eyes. But it is not only in the description of forms and actions that the bard has a strength and brilliance so wonderful: he is equally happy in the sentiments he attributes to each personage: all speak in their own distinct characters, with a justness and individuality which meet instant recognition, and waken an indescribable assent and pleasure. Thus Adam and Eve, when they know the displeasure of the Almighty, and are overwhelmed with fear and remorse, each express themselves according to their separate casts of mind, disposition, and circumstances: their moans are deeply affecting. To my taste, this book is much more lofty and much more pathetic than the ninth: as the subject was much more difficult, so it is executed with much more miraculous vigour and originality.

The representation of the manner in which God's judgment upon earth was executed by changing the seasons, putting the elements into contest, and deteriorating all nature, fills the imagination with wonder, and brings out new touches of poetry with a magical effect.

In others the poetical language seems a sort of cover,-a gilding; in Milton it is a part and essence of the thought. The primary image is poetical; the poetry does not depend upon the illustration; though sometimes there is a union, and it is thus to be found in both but if the secondary has it, the first never wants it.

The characters of Milton are all compound and reflective; they are not merely intuitive like Shakspeare's: they have therefore more of that invention which is comprehensive, and requires study to appreciate. The whole of 'Paradise Lost' from beginning to end is part of one inseparable web; and however beautiful detached parts may appear, not half their genius or wisdom can be felt or understood except in connexion with the whole. There are congruities and allusions in every word, which are lost, unless we attend to their essential relation to the whole scheme.

It is this intensity and inseparability of the web which is among the miracles of Milton's execution. Grace, strength, splendour, depth, all depend upon its unity. As no texture was ever before produced out of particles drawn from such an extent of space, and such a variety of mines; so the amalgamation of all into one perfect whole is the more astonishing.

Such is the erudition applied to this most wonderful work, that nothing less than the conjoined attempts of a whole body of learned men for a century has been able to explain its inexhaustible allusions; and even yet the task is not completed.

Little comparative invention is required for a fable drawn from history, observation, and axperience; but Milton had to travel into other worlds of higher natures, and superior powers: he had to imagine on subjects out of the human track, not only according to probability, but limited both by authority and religious awe, where nothing wanton, fantastic, or unsolemn could be endured.

It is more easy to make the fictitious resemblance of an ideal conception agreeable and brilliant at first, than of a severe abstract truth. After deep study and long examination, we find the superior grandeur and merit of the latter. Such was the praise to which Milton aspired, and to which he is entitled. There are vapours in the sky, shot through by golden beams, at which we gaze for a moment with delight; but which dissolve away, and leave us disappointed in the dark there are ignes fatui raised by some idle wanderings of nature's conflicts, which have neither heat, nor solace, nor nutriment. That which finds a clear and responsive mirror in the intellect is truth.

There are certain predispositions in the human mind to poetical visionariness: we love to view things more fair or more majestic than reality presents. By imagination we can see into the souls of characters far better than cold history instructs us: we behold thus all the loveliness of beauty, all the mightiness of strength, all the splendour of mind, all the tenderness of the heart, in their essences. But this high creativeness can only be produced by one of those purest of beings who is endued with the positive faculties of the Muse.

The spacious firmament on high,
And all the blue ethereal sky,

when pointed out by a poet's hand, fills with astonishment and devotion those who before beheld them dimly and with indifference. Thus the charms of the new world,

in which Adam and Eve were placed, were unheeded till they were delineated by Milton's song.

But it is in the associations that the grand art of impressiveness lies. In this tenth book the story is as thick wove as it is grand.

ARGUMENT.

MAN's transgression known, the guardian-angels forsake Paradise, and return up to heaven to approve their vigilance, and are approved; God declaring that the entrance of Satan could not be by them prevented. He sends his Son to judge the transgressours; who descends and gives sentence accordingly; then in pity clothes them both, and reascends. Sin and Death, sitting till then at the gates of hell, by wondrous sympathy feeling the success of Satan in this new world, and the sin by man there committed, resolve to sit no longer confined in hell but to follow Satan their sire up to the place of man: to make the way easio from hell to this world to and fro, they pave a broad highway or bridge over Chaos, according to the track that Satan first made; then, preparing for earth, they meet him, proud of his success, returning to hell; their mutual gratulation. Satan arrives at Pan dæmonium; in full assembly relates with boasting his success against man; instead of applause is entertained with a general hiss by all his audience, transformed with himself also suddenly into serpents, according to his doom given in Paradise; then deluded with a show of the forbidden tree springing up before them, they, greedily reaching to take the fruit, chew dust and bitter ashes. The proceedings of Sin and Death; God foretells the final victory of his Son over them, and the renewing of all things; but for the present commands his angels to make several alterations in the heavens and the elements. Adam more and more perceiving his fallen condition, heavily bewails, rejects the condolement of Eve; she persists, and at length appeases him: then, to evade the curse likely to fall on their offspring, proposes to Adam violent ways, which he approves not; but conceiving hetter hope, puts her in mind of the late promise made them, that her seed should be

revenged on the serpent; and exhorts her with him to seek peace of the offended Deity by repentance and supplication.

MEANWHILE the heinous and despiteful act

Of Satan done in Paradise, and how

He, in the serpent, had perverted Eve,
Her husband she, to taste the fatal fruit,

Was known in heaven; for what can 'scape the eye
Of God all-seeing, or deceive his heart

Omniscient? who, in all things wise and just,
Hinder'd not Satan to attempt the mind

Of man, with strength entire, and free-will arm'd
Complete to have discover'd and repulsed
Whatever wiles of foe or seeming friend.

For still they knew, and ought to have still remember'd,
The high injunction not to taste that fruit,
Whoever tempted; which they not obeying,
Incurr'd (what could they less?) the penalty;
And, manifold in sin, deserved to fall.
Up into heaven from Paradise in haste
The angelic guards ascended, mute and sad
For man; for of his state by this they knew,
Much wondering how the subtle fiend had stolen
Entrance unseen. Soon as the unwelcome news
From earth arrived at heaven-gate, displeased
All were who heard; dim sadness did not spare ↳
That time celestial visages, yet, mix'd
With pity, violated not their bliss.

About the new arrived in multitudes

The ethereal people ran, to hear and know
How all befel: they towards the throne supreme,
Accountable, made haste, to make appear,
With righteous plea, their utmost vigilance,
And easily approved; when the Most High
Eternal Father, from his secret cloud
Amidst, in thunder utter'd thus his voice:

Assembled angels, and ye powers return'd
From unsuccessful charge, be not dismay'd,
Nor troubled at these tidings from the earth,
Which your sincerest care could not prevent;
Foretold so lately what would come to pass,
When first this tempter cross'd the gulf from hell.
I told ye then he should prevail, and speed

a And, manifold in sin.

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Every sin is complicated in some degree: and the divines, especially those of Milton's communion, reckon up several sins as included in this one act of eating the forbidden fruit; namely, pride, uxoriousness, wicked curiosity, infidelity, disobedience, &c.; so that, for such complicated guilt he deserved to fall from his happy state in Paradise.-NEWTON.

b Dim sadness did not spare.

What a just and noble idea does Milton here give us of the blessedness of a benevolent temper; and how proper, at the same time, to obviate the objection that might be made of sadness dwelling in heavenly spirits!-THYER.

On his bad errand; man should be seduced,
And flatter'd out of all, believing lies
Against his Maker; no decree of mine
Concurring, to necessitate his fall,

Or touch with lightest moment of impulse
His free-will, to her own inclining left

In even scale. But fallen he is; and now
What rests, but that the mortal sentence pass
On his transgression, death denounced that day?
Which he presumes already vain and void,
Because not yet inflicted, as he fear'd,

c

By some immediate stroke; but soon shall find
Forbearance no acquittance, ere day end.
Justice shall not return as bounty scorn'd.

But whom send I to judge them? whom but thee,
Vicegerent Son? To thee I have transferr'd

All judgment, whether in heaven, or earth, or hell.
Easy it may be seen that I intend

Mercy colleague with justice, sending thee,
Man's friend, his Mediator, his design'd
Both ransom and Redeemer voluntary,

And destined man himself to judge man fallen.
So spake the Father; and, unfolding bright
Toward the right hand his glory, on the Son
Blazed forth unclouded deity: he full
Resplendent all his Father manifest
Express'd, and thus divinely answer'd mild:

Father Eternal, thine is to decree ;

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Mine, both in heaven and earth, to do thy will
Supreme: that thou in me, thy Son beloved,
Mayst ever rest well pleased. I go to judge

On earth these thy transgressours; but thou know'st,
Whoever judged, the worst on me must light,

When time shall be; for so I undertook

Before thee; and, not repenting, this obtain

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Of right, that I may mitigate their doom
On me derived: yet I shall temper so

Justice with mercy, as may illustrate most
Them fully satisfied, and thee appease.

Attendance none shall need, nor train, where none

Are to behold the judgment but the judged,

Those two; the third best absent is condemn'd.

c Because not yet inflicted.

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So, in Eccles. viii. 11:-"Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil."-TODD.

d To thee I have transferr'd.

From John v. 22:-"For the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment to the Son."-HUME.